Smooth Operators

Have you ever worked at a call center? I bet most of you raised your hands. I am sorry. So sorry. As a former call center employee, I can attest to how unsatisfying that line of work is, especially if you do outbound calls. Well, you’d think that one of most frustrating jobs ever would stay that way but an indie developer has made it into a rather true and accurate version of a call center. Reality, watch out, we have simulated jobs now.

This Sims game (aside from the generally too happy employees) simulates how a call center is built from the ground up and how it is run – down to the daily quotas, interactions with customers, to management of employees, hiring process, the works. And despite how boring that sounds, it actually isn’t. It, if anything, gives you a level of appreciation to the guys that run such places. It also made me realize that I’m glad I didn’t have that kind of responsibility.

It never occurred to me how much micro-management of every single employee occurred. Schedules, to paychecks, to performance all are simulated in this game. You can even budget building expansions with additional cubicles and elevators. The only thing I found a little silly is the player character trying to cheer up workers by doing a cheerleader dance. Depending on my old bosses, this might have ranged from being too cheesy to a bit horrifying.

This call center Sims game is available on Xbox Live for only 80 points.